Erm, I would like to point out that unless these laws get put to referendum, we have no say in the process, so its largely irrelevant whether we support them or not.
[/b]
Your attitude puzzle me. Politicians don't like to do stuff, that the people don't want, simply put. But if the people respond with apathy it is like a green light.
Well, looks at the "success" that popular protest has had in the last 5 years.
Fuel tax is now higher than when everyone was protesting about it. Fox-hunting went through anyway despite the protests. We went to war with Iraq despite the protests. Anti-terror legislation, which the majority (according to all the polls in the field at the time) actually wanted didn't get through. This is why there is apathy. No matter what you do, it makes no difference.
And I don't view it as impinging on any rights really. So you can get held for a bit longer if you're suspected of being a terrorist. You really have to go some to be suspected of terrorism. And indeed while the initial proposition of 90 days probably was a bit too much, there's nothing wrong with 30-40 days IMO. (And here I leave myself open to all sorts of liberal abuse.)
And while I don't particularly like all the surveillance etc, at the end of the day I have nothing to hide. So therefore I really don't care if a policeman wants to search me. I have no objections to being searched on the way onto the plane at an airport, or at the entrance to a nightclub if it means the overall experience for me is going to be safer, and thus more enjoyable.
Same goes with the terrorism thing.
Thanks for the info guys, especially you A Twig. However: You say you have to go to some extent to be a terrorist suspect in the UK. Again, sorry for being so frank, but what do you base that upon? With the accidental shooting in that metro the police was a bit hasty. Was that just a rush at the moment? When it comes to "just" confining people, realtively speaking, for a month maybe, are they not more lax when it comes to evidence?
QuoteOriginally posted by delanvital@Dec 11 2005, 11:42 PM
Thanks for the info guys, especially you A Twig. However: You say you have to go to some extent to be a terrorist suspect in the UK. Again, sorry for being so frank, but what do you base that upon? With the accidental shooting in that metro the police was a bit hasty. Was that just a rush at the moment? When it comes to "just" confining people, realtively speaking, for a month maybe, are they not more lax when it comes to evidence?
[post=104788]Quoted post[/post]
The unfortunate shooting on the tube was a hasty end to a much longer investigation. I believe they'd been investigating someone in his building for some time, and when he came outside that day they picked him up as suspicious for some reason (probably something like not recognising him and thinking he may have just picked up a bomb or something) and followed him, when for whatever reason he ran and lacking any other commands they took action and possibly the guy on the scene thought he was dealing with a bomber. You have to remember that most press reports, especially the early ones, were grossly mis-informed and seem to have pretty much made up what happened, so any press stories must be treated very warily. Personally, after reading so many conflicting stories I came to the conclusion that the press wanted to point a finger and in this case the police caught the brunt of it (sometimes the same paper would publish two conflicting stories within a few hours - I watched websites like the BBC alter their online stories from one minute to the next) I think the way the press mis-handled the information they had was terrible.
At the time of the shooting the facts that I picked up on from the press were as follows: Cops investigating some suspect chap. Some other chap exits said chaps block of flats. Some Cops tail him while they try to assess who he is and whether he may be linked to the suspected guy. For some reason (late for train, spooked by cops, spooked by armed men in civvies, whatever) Menezes starts running. Cops react without any other information as the guys on the ground have probably limited info at the time as to whether this guy is a likely bomber or just an unknown. Once the chase moves uinderground the guys on the ground lose radio and react as they were trained (perhaps there was panic, perhaps not, we will probably never know within the mire of speculation!)
...must catch train!!
One thing though.. I have read two things:
1) He ran, when order to stop
2) he was shot at close range
These two I find a bit hard to combine.
And there seems to be an inordinately large number of rounds in his body. Some even claimed he was killed on the train itself while he was sitting down. I think that we will never know exactly what happened, probably because either the information being acted upon would expose a source somewhere, or because the information was poor. There definitely seems to be a cover-up somewhere.
I think you are right.
He ran, they persued, caught up with him in the train where they tackled him and shot him at close range.
They are trained (I believe) to loosen several rounds into a struggling, potentially dangerous targets head to stop his body altogether (I've never seen anyone shot in the head, maybe we can sort of carry on briefly, like chickens...multiple traumas would stop these being co-herent)
Firing at range was not an option because if he was merely wounded he'd probably immediately set off the (possible) device. Secondly, if their bullets hit an explosive device...well.
On the cover-up side of things I think it was more a case of excitable press who simply wanted to print as many stories with as much shock value as possible. The Police handled the situation badly and bits and pieces of unconfirmed, un-corroberated info got out. Stories from people who were present in the carriage varied wildly from a single shot at rnage to an entire clip point blank. "Witnesses" saw him both vaulting the ticket barriers and calmly normally passing through. They also saw him both walk into the tube station normally and run in being chased by men with guns. What got printed was largely heresay which we cannot now believe and too many people don't trust the police's word.
I think that Menezes got spooked at some point and ran to get away from the so19 officers. The guys tailing him were under orders to follow him as a suspected "terrorist" until such time as his details had been found. I understand that they might have been under order to detain him if he tried to enter public transport, so at some point near the tube entrance they would have yelled at him to stop. Obviously they ended up chasing him into the tube where they caught him. His action of running was extremely unfortunate as once inside the tube the officers lost radio comms and would have had to act on their own volition. As he ran away when they identified themselves, their suspicions of his being a "terrorist" would have been heightened. At the point when they tackled him on the train, if he fought back they would have taken extreme action.
Menezes perhaps thought he was simply being chased by some british thugs and didn't notice the ID of "police" if one was given (you'd expect it to be practically automatic with the amount of training those guys get) and so the whole thing was an unfortunate string of events.
The fact that it hasn't been repeated is perhaps proof that the cops aren't trigger happy maniacs? We'll leave that to the Americans!
I know you get differeing accounts, but differeing that wildly? Screams cover up - a la Gibralter and countless N.I. expeditions. The British Gov has got very good at hiding the work of its SF IMHO.
However many years later, and no-one still quite knows what the actual outcome of the Gibralter shootings were, and I suspect a similar thing will occur with these shootings as well.
The paradoxical nature of the statements screams cover-up, yeah.
Speaking of cover-up and the US - have any of you read the article by Pinter? The nobel price winner in litterature?
http://nobelprize.org/literature/laureates...-lecture-e.html (http://nobelprize.org/literature/laureates/2005/pinter-lecture-e.html)
Skip the first part with theather if you don't feel like reading such a big text. The content is not that new, but it does brings some thoughts up in you...
QuoteOriginally posted by delanvital@Dec 13 2005, 02:12 PM
The paradoxical nature of the statements screams cover-up, yeah.
Speaking of cover-up and the US - have any of you read the article by Pinter? The nobel price winner in litterature?
http://nobelprize.org/literature/laureates...-lecture-e.html (http://nobelprize.org/literature/laureates/2005/pinter-lecture-e.html)
Skip the first part with theather if you don't feel like reading such a big text. The content is not that new, but it does brings some thoughts up in you...
[post=105032]Quoted post[/post]
Powerful reading. History does teach us a lot of things and of course history is taking place now. I would concentrate a moment if Pinters opening on truth. There are always many truths I would also quote MacMillan when quizzed by a journalist what can steer a governement off course - "Events, dear boy, events". So what Pinter gives us, and his examples, are his representation of truth. Whatever the truth, decisions are often not policy driven, but event driven - the truth kind of matters less?
So the anti-terrorism laws and indeed the killing of Manezes can be seen as reactions to events. A less eventful world may allow for better policy making, but the events seem to make events.
I dont know if any of this rambling makes sense to anyone - its is Friday afternoon.
A few closing questions.
Wouldnt you have to be mad to be a politician?
How mad must you be to want to lead a country?
Any volunteers?
Free speech seems to be at play here and we should value that also?
QuoteOriginally posted by big-paddy@Dec 16 2005, 02:49 PM
Wouldnt you have to be mad to be a politician?
How mad must you be to want to lead a country?
Any volunteers?
Free speech seems to be at play here and we should value that also?
Should those who want to be in power be the ones to whom the power is granted? If not them then how shall we choose? :unsure: Makes me think of Douglas adams and the guy who is in charge of the universe that they go and see 8)
I do tend to think that with todays technology we could be better consulted on important issues than we are currently. I kinda like the idea of having a reprentative that we can constantly overrule if necessary. The politicians response of course is that people dont know enough to make decisions - but that also feeds dont tell them because they wouldnt understand. A virtuous circle huh!
QuoteOriginally posted by big-paddy@Dec 16 2005, 03:59 PM
I do tend to think that with todays technology we could be better consulted on important issues than we are currently. I kinda like the idea of having a reprentative that we can constantly overrule if necessary. The politicians response of course is that people dont know enough to make decisions - but that also feeds dont tell them because they wouldnt understand. A virtuous circle huh!
[post=105594]Quoted post[/post]
The thing is, who determins who can and can't have a say. I agree with you that *I* would like to be able to majority overrule my representative, but at the same time I really don't like the idea of the local Neighbourhood O' Chavs (every town has one) being able to do the same. And i'm sure there are some otherwise OK people who would overrule just for 'fun', for a laugh.
QuoteOriginally posted by Carr0t@Dec 16 2005, 04:06 PM
The thing is, who determins who can and can't have a say. I agree with you that *I* would like to be able to majority overrule my representative, but at the same time I really don't like the idea of the local Neighbourhood O' Chavs (every town has one) being able to do the same. And i'm sure there are some otherwise OK people who would overrule just for 'fun', for a laugh.
[post=105595]Quoted post[/post]
I have to admit that I have trouble with words like 'fun' and 'a laugh' used negatively. Fun for me is a long lasting experience, not a quick fix (hope not to offend). So sure we might get some idiots having short term 'fun', but they should soon learn responsibility. Britain dont do citizenship well. The counter might be that we have never felt the need to. One reason might be the maturity of our democracy. I dont think anyone here feels a revolution is necessary, but when you look across Europe many countries are within a generation of the last civil war or worse occupation.
The problems government deals with are massive. We only have a bit of the information, couldnt deal with more - check out MPs attendance at most debates - they have to divide interest areas. I dont know the answer, its just on certain issues I would like a voice. I voted for a party at the last election, not the individual. I've never met the chap, dont know what he thinks, what his background is - he does not represent me. That was my only choice.
BBC Radio 4 have been debating who runs Britain for two weeks. they have had loads of politicians on and some intellectuals. After two weeks they still havent reached a conclusion. That seems to sum up the problem for us here.
I know this is under Seriously.., but I did like the response of one of the women they interviewed today. She answered the question quite simply - Men.
QuoteOriginally posted by big-paddy@Dec 19 2005, 05:10 PM
BBC Radio 4 have been debating who runs Britain for two weeks. they have had loads of politicians on and some intellectuals. After two weeks they still havent reached a conclusion. That seems to sum up the problem for us here.
[post=105972]Quoted post[/post]
That made me smile, yet it is so tragic. And then I have to ask: your pulling my leg, right?
QuoteOriginally posted by delanvital@Dec 19 2005, 07:24 PM
That made me smile, yet it is so tragic. And then I have to ask: your pulling my leg, right?
[post=106008]Quoted post[/post]
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/vote/who...ain/index.shtml (http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/vote/whorunsbritain/index.shtml)
Is the answer Benny?
QuoteOriginally posted by big-paddy@Dec 20 2005, 12:13 PM
Is the answer Benny?
[post=106135]Quoted post[/post]
Schhhh... :whistle: